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I’ve always used my email address as my username on this site. Not a good idea per your faq! Can username be changed? This is no biggie, if no way for me to do in my account. I know you have bigger fish to fry!

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Yay! Glad to see things reverting to a more appealing approach. I’d gotten to where I was not reading the newsletter because it seemed like it appealed to a different audience. Happy that you and the rest of the team are back in control.

The site will remain AskWoody and much will essentially be the same for non-AskWoody Plus users. Anonymous posting will still be allowed.
We are adding benefits like the Newsletter and additional Lounge access (eventually, under construction) for those who become Plus members.

We were on shaky ground sticking with the name “Windows Secrets” anyway. There’s a long history of permissions granted decades ago — enough to keep IP attorneys employed for months — but Microsoft is very protective of the name “Windows.”

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The one thing I didn’t see covered in the FAQ was different user names in WS and AW. I imagine that there will be others in the same boat that I will be in when the transfer is done.

From what I’ve gathered so far, WS user accounts will be transferred to AW and then renamed to the AW user name (saving all the previous history under the WS user name to the AW name). Is that the plan so far ??

Don't take yourself so seriously, no one else does 🙂
Grp. A with 2 Win 7 Pro, also 2 Win 10 Pro currently 1803 (1 Desktop, 1 Laptop).

That’s an ongoing concern. A big problem is that we can’t transfer the passwords from WS to AW – they’re incompatible and I don’t trust them anyway. (Long story.)

My current plan is to modify all of the WS usernames to append “WS” to the front of the name. Then invite people to use the standard password reset techniques if they want to get into the old WS accounts. If they already have an AW account, I can manually delete and merge the old WS account into the new AW account — and, fingers crossed, everything will transfer over to the new AW account.

Once your check has been cleared, your subscription will be activated (assuming you gave your email address, as instructed). If you didn’t provide your email address, you will need to email Customer Support

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Now I am a Plus user! I did it through PayPal. It was quick and easy. The initial PayPal billing and email shows as a recurring payment. Yet within seconds a subsequent PayPal email shows that the recurring payment profile was cancelled. The upshot is that PayPal near instantly converts the recurring payment to a one-time billing.

So here it is, my first post, although I have been reading (and learning from) AskWoody and lounge discussions for years. For years before that, I was a Windows Secrets subscriber, almost from the beginning. I let that lapse some years ago when Penton(?) took over and my voluntary annual donation was deemed insufficient. I was excited to hear about the new merger of the old gang and AskWoody, (we’re gettin’ the band back together!) that’s a + I want to be a part of!

My question is: should I register here on the forum first? Or join AskWoody Plus first and then register here in the Lounge? When I join AskWoodyPlus will I create a username to use here in the Lounge or is that a separate action to be done after I am a member in good standing?

Apologies if this has been answered already. I am overly cautious about such matters (just ask my wife), I simply don’t want to screw up.

Sincere thanks to all of you who’ve been unknowingly helping me with Windows conundrums for years.

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When you register, your ID should not be your email address, but we will need for you to include a valid email address in the registration process if you intend to subscribe to the Newsletter and Alerts. Links to registration and the AskWoody Plus membership are in the upper right corner of the blog page.

Be aware that your first post will need to be moderated. But afterward, posting will be immediate.

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Well, okay then. I have had a wordpress account with an account pic, but I signed up with them using a hotmail addy, I have never merged or authorized the actual gravatar site to use that anywhere though. I don’t think I want to do that. I joined AskWoody using my gmail. I do have a gmail avatar picture though so maybe it will show up. Guess we will see.

Just to add, the other day when I went to WordPress/gravatar and entered my gmail address it didn’t show my avatar until I put in woodys url and under details I put my user name. Then the avatar showed up.

Don't take yourself so seriously, no one else does 🙂
Grp. A with 2 Win 7 Pro, also 2 Win 10 Pro currently 1803 (1 Desktop, 1 Laptop).

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I won’t store any sensitive information on this site, other than email addresses (which we need to keep various things working). If you want to spoof an email address, that’s fine with me – several Microsoft employees, among others, do exactly that. If you want me to delete your account, just drop a line to CustomerSupport@AskWoody.com.

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So here it is, my first post, although I have been reading (and learning from) AskWoody and lounge discussions for years. For years before that, I was a Windows Secrets subscriber, almost from the beginning. I let that lapse some years ago when Penton(?) took over and my voluntary annual donation was deemed insufficient. I was excited to hear about the new merger of the old gang and AskWoody, (we’re gettin’ the band back together!) that’s a + I want to be a part of!

I also was a subscriber to WindowsSecrets until Penton took over. After that, it seemed this publication was directed to a very different audience. My question is will it be possible to access material on Windows 7 in the newsletters. Hopefully, I can read Woody’s, Tracey’s, Ms. Susan’s, and Fred’s articles in WindowsSecrets.

For those of you interested in net neutrality, Woody and Lincoln had some excellent articles on this subject. Lincoln’s article included his recent experience with one of the few independent ISPs. Amazingly, his company installed fiber optic cables and then lowered the price.

Thanks in advance for advice on accessing old articles on Windows 7 from yesteryear.

Attachments:

We will soon be in the process of importing WS data to AskWoody. But since the structure of the two sites and the software that is/was used is quite different, it may take a while for the import to be available to our readers. At this point, it is under constructions, but I’m not sure we have the “drawings” yet, so we’ll have to wait and see how it builds out.

All of the people here, both those moderating and those providing information/answers are volunteers. None of us are subject to demands for immediate attention. We all work hard and and when we can provide the services, we do so. Posing a question multiple times in a short period of time doesn’t give us more hours in our day. Please be patient. You are one of thousands we serve.

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I have the Plus badge on my avatar on one of my machines, and the commenters’ names are listed horizontally under articles as they should be. On my other machine, however, the Plus badge is missing and the commenters’ names are listed vertically. Both machines are Windows 6 x64 desktops running Chrome.

Is this all part of the “work in progress” or is there anything I can change on the second machine to fix it please?

Is there a way of doing so without using an external site for holding images as I don’t use any? It’s exactly as I explained, however. Originally when the site changes were started both machines listed commenters vertically and I was told (I think by Kirsty in a PM) that this was being fixed, but it’s only fixed on one machine. Once my subscription went through, the Plus badge appeared on my avatar on that machine but not the other.

Thanks both, your time is appreciated. I’ll hang on and see what happens as the dust settles, most of the time I use the correctly displaying machine anyway so I was really only interested in passing on some feedback and seeing if there was something to fix at my end on the incorrectly displaying machine (which I logged into the site on freshly today).

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Woody, I thought the same thing, that it might be add-ons. I went back and checked and nothing stood out. Then I was re-reading the thread and saw the “clear the cache”. That did it. Not sure why, since I had not logged on to the Forum with Chrome until after the “Plus” tag was applied. Oh well.

I just had to join in on the conversation. I was an unlimited Windows Secrets member, but ignored it when Penton took over. Joined up with AskWoody. So I am a reoccuring Patreon member here, but I want my fancy blue badge on my avatar. I like shiny things…

I have gotten the new newsletter in my email. I wasn’t sure what to do next after reading through all these posts.

BTW, I could switch back to my JigglyPuff and I’m sure it would be there. That was just some fun I was having with my boys (one of them is at Microsoft). Always fun to hear the stories from the inside…

As I am not really that interested on everything Windows, just on patching my old PC’s Windows 7 for as long as that lasts, am not a system administrator and my business is not taking care of problems other people have with their computers, but am also interested on things Mac and Linux, as well as Office:

Could I remain plain OscarCP without that golden ribbon and still contribute money to Woody’s? Even if others wrongly think that I am too cheap to send money?

In such a case, would I become unable to do the few things I do at Woody’s, such as reading what others post, and making occasional postings to all streams open to the now ribboned-loungers? Thanks.

Could I remain plain OscarCP without that golden ribbon and still contribute money to Woody’s? Even if others wrongly think that I am too cheap to send money?

You most certainly can donate, using the Plus Membership link, but just untick the Subscribe to the AskWoody Plus Newsletter option. There is no compulsion for donors to subscribe!

Remember to do all this from your logged-in account, to make things easier! Thks.

The flare on the avatar should show our donors, not just our subscribers, but with a few things still not working as they should, that may not be how it currently appears – apologies to anyone so affected, if that is the case 🙂

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One last question (just in case): since you’ve made clear it makes no difference, on Woody’s side, whether I take or not some of Plus “perks”, would it be possible to subscribe to the Newsletter to see what it is like, and if turns out that one is not really interested, then unsuscribe to it?

(Note: I would expect the answer to be either “yes” or “yes, but.” I ask obvious questions like this, sometimes, because, sometimes, I get unexpected answers, and some of them are really good.)

I don’t see a way at present to cancel your subscription from My Account, but there is a link in each emailed newsletter, to enable you to unsubscribe, should you not feel you benefit from receiving the emails.
There is also a link in the emails to update your preferences, which allows you to change your email address for the subscription – this can also be achieved in My Account too.

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The Home page also now has a Newsletter/Alerts tab that Woodys says will eventually only be available to Plus Members. This appears to list the Newsletters. So do Plus Members even need to have a weekly email delivered?

The Newsletter button in the bar at the top should be accessible to Plus members for online perusal. When you sign up for Plus you should be able to opt out of email delivery but still access the online version. I notice you don’t have the Plus badge on your avatar yet.

Click on the Text tab (upper right of reply box). Highlight the word, then click on

link

. That will bring up a box to paste the URL into. Click “Add Link”.

Alternately, you can click on

link

and fill in “Link Text”, “here”, and add the URL. The result looks messy in the Text tab, because it shows the code, so I always click back on the Visual tab to see what it will more nearly look like when posted.

Another hint to using the Text tab- if you use Copy/Paste in part of your post, do the paste into the Text tab, and excess HTML will be automatically deleted. Pasting into the Visual tab may show unintended formating code carried forward when the reply is posted. (You would see it if you go back to the Text tab, and wonder where all that came from).

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There are some posts dated yesterday further up the page, just search for the string February from the top. It’s a (minor) problem with having nested posts; if someone replies to a much earlier post it won’t appear at the bottom as it would if all posts were chronological.

Correct, but the posts you haven’t read while logged in will show with “New” to the left of the date. This is something to be wary of if you’re replying to one post before reading all the New-tagged posts, as reloading the topic page to reply will lose all those tags.

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